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The date was September 11, 2001. I was awakened by my partner in the late morning with the bad news. Like everyone in the world, we stared astonished at the images and words coming at us through the television... it was devastating to say the least, and just getting started.

Coincidentally, I had committed to a DJ set at a club in the Mission that night, which was a Tuesday... Club Galía (later known as "Twelve Galaxies", at 2565 Mission Street & 22nd Street) was run by an open-minded owner and was usually only lightly attended by local bar-goers during the week. So she didn't mind the avant-garde tech-noise music I planned to bring. I had already selected most of the records I wanted and made a loose set order, so after watching the horror drama unfold all day, I was ready to get out and do something to release my emotional energy.

When I contacted the club in the late afternoon, they said that all the other acts had canceled, but I could come anyway if I wanted to. I immediately called ROBO to see if he wanted to join and play his own set. He said he wasn't in the mood to play a set, but he had been sampling TV all day (something I was just too affected to do), so he offered to team up and "sample-drop" during my set. I was immediately enamored with the idea! So we made our plan to be there on time, where I would play the records and he would surprise me with his 911-themed sample suite, which included TV samples from the day, his own voice treatments and related bits from old records in his collection.

When we got to the club, there were only a few people there, who appeared to have been drinking heavily, hunched over the bar with heads in hands. That's all I remember about anyone or anything in the club. We played the set to each other, with furtive looks passed at pivotal moments... it was dark and powerful and emotive, and when the set reached the penultimate, mournful passage (Third Eye Foundation), I felt my grief well up into tears as ROBO's eyewitness report samples hammered it home. The final piece is an angry, scorching original recording by NBC that honestly I forgot about digging up for that performance until now... not sure when/where it is from but it was probably recorded at ROBO's studio at one of our many jam sessions from 1998-2001. All I can say is that is one powerful noise piece that I wish I still had in the archive...

Anyhow, check out the original CD-R cover art; in addition to the acknowledgement of the prophetic nature of ROBO's samples (Bush Jr. and the media were already chanting for war), you can see that I only made 20 physical copies, 19 of which are out there somewhere. I like that the "20/20" coincides with this year, another time of great calamity and confusion, so perhaps it was a sign to pursue making this available again after 19 years on the shelf. This digital release has been remastered and the tracks condensed into two parts because of upload limitations. PLAY LOUD!

-zerø K 2020